Fic: The Life and Times of Milo Conchord, Part 1
Title: The Life and Times of Milo Conchord
Part 1: Conception
Author: she_burns1
Pairing: Bret/Jemaine
Rating: Ranges from PG to R
Word Count: 2,404
Summary: The chronicles of Bret and Jemaine's son - from conception to adulthood.
Disclaimer: All recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The plot is all mine. No copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Note: I actually wrote most of this a looooooong time ago but never posted it here/to the comm - so I thought I'd go ahead and finally share! ;) As always, one has to take this with a grain of salt and imagine this not only in a FOTC kind of world, but also a much nicer one, in which two men can chose to have a child and there not be so much, well, hassle.
It all started when a section of the wall began rotting out.
Eugene came unannounced into Bret and Jemaine's apartment one morning and began hammering at the wall farthest from Bret and Jemaine's bedroom. This was unfortunate for numerous reasons, chief among them that Bret and Jemaine had been sleeping in their beds when this racket started.
Jemaine, the best at being grumpy, charged over, "Eugene! What're you doing here?"
Unfazed, Eugene continued hammering at the decomposing plaster, "Oh. Hey, Jemaine. Didn't know you were here."
"I live here."
"Right."
"I live here, too," Bret offered as he walked over, a bemused expression on his face as he watched Eugene work. At first he had been frightened by the loud noises, thinking a burglar had entered, but now, knowing it was Eugene, he was more hospitable.
Jemaine was less so, "Eugene, get out."
"Can't," Eugene muttered, hammer still tearing away at the wall, "Noticed this wall giving way last time I was here."
"Last time you were here?" Jemaine echoed, trying to remember the last time he had even seen Eugene set foot in their apartment.
Eugene continued as if uninterrupted, "Could be pretty bad for me if I don't fix it. Mean, being the super and all. Can't rebuild the wall, mind you, but I can tear it out. See, on the other side, there's a utility closet. Don't use it much - guess it'll have to be a part of your apartment now. Make the space bigger."
"I don't want the space bigger, Eugene. I want the wall."
"Well, too bad. You're going to have to have it. Can't have the city finding out the walls are going bad. Don't worry, you'll get used to it. It'll be like having another bedroom. Closet's about that big. Good place for sleeping, hiding out..."
Jemaine shuddered, not wanting to think more about that. He turned to Bret, wanting to get his reaction to this and immediately wished he hadn't. Bret looked - well, for lack of a better term, 'starry eyed'.
And immediately Jemaine knew why.
"No."
"Jemaine..."
"I said 'no', Bret." Jemaine said firmly, walking away from both Eugene and the ever growing hole in their wall.
He went to the bathroom and brushed his teeth. He got dressed. He walked outside. And the entire time, Bret talked and talked. He only got snippets, but they were more than enough.
"But Jemaine-"
"...Jemaine, you said-"
"...a bigger space means..."
"...a little bed would fit in there, I'm sure..."
"...been together a long time now..."
"...I've always wanted..."
Jemaine finally stopped on, "…don't care if it's a boy or a girl..." and turned to Bret, face set, "Bret, we're not having a baby."
"Why not?" Bret positively whined.
"Well, neither you nor I could carry one so-"
"Thought about that and, mean, you know, I think we could probably get a surrogate m-"
"Bret! I said 'no'!"
The look on Bret's face was so crestfallen that Jemaine sighed, running a hand through his hair. He hated feeling like the bad guy. And the look on Bret's face...if his lower lip did that thing...
Bret's lower lip trembled, voice choked with oncoming tears, "Jemaine..."
Jemaine rubbed at his face, hands going up under his glasses, "Bret..."
"We'd be good parents."
"Bret..."
"Jemaine...I love you."
"Love you, too," Jemaine said this quietly, almost a whisper.
"...but mean...want more...just a little more..."
"Bret..."
"One baby, Jemaine. Just one. Ours. I'd...I'd like...very much..."
Jemaine took in the biggest, deepest, heaviest breath of his life. Even more so than the one he had taken when he had admitted, for the first time, that he was in love with his best friend. He took it and said, "Okay."
Bret blinked, his whole mouth trembling now, this time with barely leashed hope and excitement, "Oh...O-okay?"
Jemaine shook his head, "I'm going to regret this..."
+
Mel was thrilled.
Ecstatic.
On the moon.
She had also fainted.
Doug was still trying to bring her around.
Jemaine had his hands in his pockets, voice gentle, "Want to thank you for this again, Doug."
Doug just shrugged as he continued to try and rouse his wife, "It's okay. Actually, Mel had been talking about having a second child as it was. And you know, I love kids but, Jaret over there," He inclined his head over to the toddler Bret was playing with, "He's a bit of a handful as it is, so...this kind of works out for everyone really..."
Jemaine looked at Jaret and shook his head, "Still don't know how you do it..."
Doug shrugged, "It's not that hard, Jemaine. I mean, for me, the hardest part was the name. Mel had us go over so many mash-ups of your and Bret's names before we settled on a good one."
"Still think Mainet wasn't too bad," Jemaine offered, "Sounds French."
Doug merely nodded as Mel moaned, coming too, "Ohhhh..."
"Honey...you okay?"
"Doug?"
"Yes?"
"Oh Doug...I had the craziest dream...I dreamed Bret and Jemaine asked me to be their surrogate..."
"They did." Doug offered gently.
Mel's eyes went glassy and she looked about ready to swoon again. Jemaine swooped into her vision, voice earnest, "You didn't say 'yes' yet, so..."
Mel quickly regained strength, leaping to her feet, voice shrill as she threw her arms around his neck, hugging him so tightly he could barely breath, "Yes! Yes! Oh, yes!"
Jemaine tried to disentangle himself from Mel as Bret approached, holding Jaret close. Jaret looked at his mother apprehensively, "Mommy?"
"Oh, sweetie," Mel held out her arms and took her child from Bret, her voice full of rapture as she cooed to him, "Sweetie, Mommy's going to have another baby!"
Jaret frowned, "Right now?"
Mel merely giggled coquettishly and rubbed her nose along her son's, "No, no, silly! But soon! Right?" she looked from Bret to Jemaine and back again, "Soon?"
"'Magine...mean...we probably have to go through some paperwork first..."
"Oh. Oh! Of course, yeah, yeah, right..." Mel said, rocking back and forth, hugging her child, "But soon...soon, we can...you know, conceive."
She managed to make this sound very sexual.
Both Bret and Jemaine blanched.
Doug cleared his throat, "Mel...I think...I mean, you know it's going to be an artificial insemination, right?"
Mel blinked.
Doug tried again, "I mean...either Bret or Jemaine will...you know...make a deposit...and then..."
"Oh," Mel laughed again, "Oh! Yeah, yeah, no, no, I know that! That's so silly, I mean, of course, I know that, but you know...mean...if...if either of you," she looked meaningfully from Bret to Jemaine, "wanted to...you know...do this...well, naturally...I'd understand...I wouldn't mind..."
Both Bret and Jemaine shook their heads wordlessly.
Doug just sighed and rolled his eyes, "This should be interesting."
+
"Baby meeting! Bret?"
"Present."
"Jemaine."
"Remember when we used to have band meetings?"
"Jemaine?"
Jemaine groaned, leaning back in his chair, "Present."
Murray wrote on his pad of paper, "Ah yes, well, now that we've acknowledged you're here, Jemaine, you may ask questions."
"I don't have a question. I was just remarking on how we haven't spoken about our band in years. We went from band meetings to relationship meetings to wedding meetings and now-"
"Jemaine, as the Deputy Cultural Attaché for New Zealand it's my job to oversee important government and legal matters pertaining to our native land here in our...not-so-native land..."
"Like our immigration papers."
"Ah, now, well, see, I got that fixed!"
"We got deported first."
"But I got it fixed! " Murray stressed, "All right? So we can just drop that and focus on, ah, well, bigger and much more important affairs! Such as your and Bret's future offspring! Now, on that note," Murray reached beneath his desk and pulled out several bags, which he deposited on the desk between them, "Item one: books! I managed to get you lots of reading material on the subjects of babies, children, and laundry."
"Laundry?" Bret questioned as he began rifling through the bags.
"Yes, well, there was some miscommunication at first. When I heard you were expecting a bundle of joy I thought, well, mean, a 'bundle' tends to refer to clothing, so-"
"Bundle can mean lots of things, Murray," Jemaine pointed out.
"Well to me, I thought of laundry, and since you didn't have a washing machine of your own, I initially assumed you were getting one...then I spoke with Greg and he told me different..."
As if summoned (or at least heard through the intercom) Greg appeared in the doorway, "Hey Bret. Jemaine."
"Greg." Both men greeted simultaneously.
Greg held out a little bag, "For you."
"Oh, wow. Thanks, man!" Bret took the bag and opened it to find a stuffed toy bear inside. He waved it at Jemaine, "Look! His first toy!"
"Or her."
"Right." Bret said, smiling broadly.
Jemaine breathed in loudly through his nose, a small smile taking his face. While he was still going into this with some trepidation he had to admit, seeing Bret's face now, it all seemed well worth it.
Murray was leafing through some of the books, "Now, see here, this one is about what to expect when you're expecting...and this one here? It's about breast feeding..."
"Murray, neither Bret or I will need that one."
"Oh?"
"We don't have breasts, Murray," Jemaine reminded him patiently.
"Oh! Yes! Right, well, mean...this could still be useful...and this one here? About washing your delicates? Baby clothing's quite delicate, I believe..."
"It's great, Murray," Bret said, his face glowing with happiness.
Jemaine sighed and sat up, grabbing one of the bags, he reached inside to pull out a book. It was entitled, 'She's Having a Baby - and I'm Having a Breakdown'. Jemaine's lower lip jutted out a bit as he nodded thoughtfully to himself and he began flipping through it.
+
"So...you don't know which one is the Father?"
Bret and Jemaine both shook their heads.
Bret explained further, "We both...," he blushed, unable to continue, instead settling on a vague, 'you know' and a very slight hand gesture before continuing, "...and then we, well, we left it up to the Doctor...we don't want to know who did what...'s better that way. All that matters is that we're both parents. We'll both be his or her father."
"You mean fathers," Dave provided, then shook his head, "Some crazy shit, man. You two having a kid together. That's going to be one weird lil' fucker...mean, not 'cause he or she'll have two Dads, mean, I think that shit's pretty neat - like that show, you know, back in the 80s or whatever the fuck about the chick with two dads...think it was called that even, but-"
Dave waved a hand before picking up again, "Whatever...your little monster...mean, its gonna be American, right? And you two'll still be from Greece or some shit. Kid won't come out with an accent...right?" This ended in a question, because the more Dave thought about it, the more he wasn't sure that that wasn't possible. Maybe the kid would have their weird ass accent.
But both Bret and Jemaine shook their heads again, Jemaine offering, "No. Baby'll be American. Mean...first off, born here in New York and second, well, Mel will be the Mom...kind of..."
"'Kind of'?"
Bret spoke up, "She's having the baby, but we'll be raising it."
"Right, right..."
"Mean, she'll always be around but...this is our child."
"Yeah, no, that's cool. I imagine you guys have it all worked out."
Both men nodded and Dave gave a low whistle, "Man, time flies. Just to think...coupla years ago you two were just loser band mates. Then you became loser bed mates. Then loser married mates and now...loser baby mates..."
"Could drop the 'loser' part, Dave," Jemaine supplied.
Dave just shrugged, "I call 'em like I see 'em. Your kid'll probably be better off though...mean, being an American has its advantages. And with me as his Uncle or Godfather or whatever the fuck...mean, you know, this kid," he nodded encouragingly, "Probably'll turn out all right. I'll take him, or, you know, her, under my wing, make 'em a real bad ass..."
Bret smiled. Jemaine just shook his head. That's when all three heard a peculiar noise.
Dave scowled, "What the fuck is that?"
Both Bret and Jemaine made the sounds universally recognized as 'I don't know.'
"Sounds like a cell phone. A cell phone with a real stupid ass ringtone."
"Oh!" Bret perked up and reached into his back pocket, "Yeah! Right. Forgot. Doug gave this to me. Said it was best if we had one. Seeing as we're going to be parents soon..."
Jemaine blinked, surprised, "That was nice of him."
"Yeah," Bret muttered and held the small device, confused, "It was...how do you..."
"Christ! You two are gonna have a kid and you're nothing but a coupla babies yourselves, hand it over," Dave muttered, grabbing the phone from him and answering it, "Yo!"
Bret and Jemaine watched with fascination.
"Yeah, no, man, this is Dave...what? Oh yeah, no, they're right here, what's up, man? Uh huh....uh huh...uh huh...right, right...you know what that shit is yet? Oh, yeah, I see....riiiight. Okay. Well, cool, bro, I'll tell 'em. Hey, you want to come by later? Maybe play some poker? Yeah, well, you know where I live...uh huh, yeah, figured...cool, cool, talk to you later, peace."
Dave hung up the phone and handed it back to Bret.
Bret and Jemaine looked at Dave expectantly. Dave said nothing. Finally Jemaine broke, "Dave?"
"Yeah?"
"The phone call..."
"...yeah?"
"Who-"
"Oh!" Dave grinned, "Yeah, that was Doug. Hey, when did you say you two left your deposits?"
Both men looked at each other, then at Dave, Bret speaking first, "Deposits?"
"Your swimmers. You know, at the Doctor's, when you two beat off."
"Oh! Oh!" Bret turned red, wanting to interrupt him before he could continue, "Um...couple days..."
"Right, well, guess its been long enough, 'cause your girl's got 'em and she's good to go, so, you know, congrats."
Both Bret and Jemaine returned to their earlier confused looks.
Dave sighed, rolling his eyes, "Doug called. Mel's pregnant. With a baby. One of yours. Or both of yours. Or whatever-the-fuck. So, congratulations, you dumbasses."
Bret turned to Jemaine and his face was so joyful it was almost blinding. He threw his arms around Jemaine's neck and hugged him tightly. Jemaine just smiled and hugged him back. Dave made gagging noises and looked away.